ADRs End Higher; Exscientia, Shell Among Companies Actively Trading

   By Kimberly Chin

International stocks trading in New York closed higher Friday. The S&P/BNY Mellon index of American depositary receipts rose 0.7% to 163.01. The European index improved 0.8% to 148.42. The Asian index rose 0.3% to 212.19. The Latin American index increased 1.9% to 180.70. And the emerging-markets index was up 0.3% at 344.87.

Exscientia PLC’s ADRs rose 10% Friday after the artificial intelligence company partnered with Sanofi SA to develop up to 16 new oncology and immunology drug candidates using Exscientia’s AI platform. Exscientia will receive an upfront payment of $100 million from Sanofi. Sanofi’s ADRs rose 1.2%.

Royal Dutch Shell PLC’s ADRs rose 1.1% after the oil-and-gas major said Friday that it will distribute the remaining $5.5 billion of proceeds from the sale of its Permian Basin assets in the U.S. through share buybacks.

AstraZeneca PLC’s ADRs rose 1.4% after the pharmaceutical giant said Friday that it has signed an exclusive global collaboration and license agreement with Neurimmune for the development and commercialization of NI006, a treatment for transthyretin amyloid cardiomyopathy.

Write to Kimberly Chin at kimberly.chin@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

January 07, 2022 18:55 ET (23:55 GMT)